


Black Moon

by sickmorbid



Category: The Evil Within (Video Game)
Genre: Angst, Character Death, M/M, Rebirth, Self Confidence Issues, Violence, confused feelings, tags will change
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-10-05
Updated: 2018-10-05
Packaged: 2019-07-25 10:14:34
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 847
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16195475
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sickmorbid/pseuds/sickmorbid
Summary: He wished he could say the pain wasn't familiar--wish he could say the branding of smoke into his flesh was a new feeling. In mythology a phoenix would ride out from its own ashes, reborn again into a new and blazing inferno.But for Stefano, the hot sting of shrapnel to his face only drags him further into hell.





	Black Moon

The first thing to break his dead conscious was the heave of his chest.

One painful breath in a sea of darkness, lungs shakingly expanding underneath stained clothing plastered to his cracked flesh for too long. His face, frozen in time with the gaping stare of death, twitched back to life, his mouth hanging open and dried from stale air. One breath became two, just as painful as the first, and as he settled into a steady but raspy rhythm he could feel a degree of moisture returning to his mouth. His tongue peeled back from the roof of his mouth and settled numb against his teeth, leaving the impressioned palette numb.

The blackness that swarmed his vision and his mind was broken only by pulsing veins of white that wriggled with each breath, little fleshy branches tugging and pulling at the edges of his vision. Flecks of purple and red dotted every exhale in pointilist mockery. As he leveled his breathing he found the strength to close his mouth again, chapped and bloodied lips uncomfortably rubbing against each other as he pressed his tongue to his cheek. Black lightened to a dark clay color and the illusion of pulsing veins instead retreated into a sharp ache just behind his eyes, a cold knock against his skull in tandem with his deafened heartbeat. Furrowing his brows, he forced his sticky eyelids open.

Though a dull, crimson haze blurred his vision and the walls seemed to shift in double vision he was vaguely aware of his surroundings--or rather, aware he was laying on the floor, sprawled out and alone.

He blinked, the motion making his eye sting with water, overly-salty tears pooling at the corner and threatening to mutiny at any moment. He gritted his teeth and pressed his dry lips into a hard frown, thinking about the situation for a moment; he couldn’t quite remember how he ended up there, or how long it had been since he… died. As he laid on the ground and stumbled along the fog of his memory he remembered the flashy smoke of a bullet and the ringing in his ears, though the figure in the mist was too blurred for him to discern. He decided his best option would be to peel himself off the floor.

Doing so was much harder than he originally thought. Simply attempting to shift his weight made his muscles scream. Both his skin and clothes stuck to the floor, caked in thick pools of blood--his own blood at that--that glued him to the cold floor, furthering the misery in movement. As he pulled himself out of the coagulated crimson the pain hit him in waves, forcing the pent up tears down his face anyways and eliciting a hiss from between his clenched teeth, still pristine and white despite the flecks of blood decorating his lips and chin.

It was a pain he was familiar with. To die and be reborn again.

With another muffled grunt of pain and a whispered curse he focused all of his willpower towards tensing his shoulders and abdomen, slowly raising himself into a sitting position despite the creaking protest from his spine. He immediately felt a wave of exhaustion hit him, the corners of his vision fading momentarily to a dark grey as he gasped breathlessly and threatening to knock him on his back again. 

He lurched forward over his legs, mouth parted in shallow breaths and face tilted down, black bangs sticky with cold sweat and drooping off of his face. He squeezed his eyes closed in thought, letting his lungs fall back into a soft pattern and strength seep back into his worn and used body.

He shuffled until his legs were no longer plastered to the ground, pulling his knees up towards his chest and resting his head against them for support, bangs pushing into his ruined cheek. His calves throbbed with a dull ache similar to a sleeping cramp, a sensation that seemed to ghost its way up through the rest of his body. He let himself have a quiet moment before raising his head and opening his eyes again; It was the first time he had a real chance to assess the situation, now that moving himself wasn't the top priority.

His attire, once a bold shade of checkered blue, now laid streaked with blood and bunched tightly to his skin, seeping all the way to his bare flesh and seemingly into his core. The smell of blood--something he once found comfort in--now burned in his nostrils, causing him to flare them in disgust and frown hard, the strong scent of metal suddenly reminding him too much of the pierce of a bullet. Sharp prickles of pain darted across every part of his body like white hot needles being poked and twisted into his skin, lighting his broken skin on fire.

He had been ruined. The image he created himself after, the masterpiece, was now tattered and stained in crimson. His own crimson. 

He let this happen. He was ashamed.

**Author's Note:**

> follow me on twitter @livelovesimon !


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